


Trophy

by thimble



Category: Free!
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-17
Updated: 2013-10-17
Packaged: 2017-12-29 17:07:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,792
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1007922
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thimble/pseuds/thimble
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He waits for money to be added in his bank account. He waits for his mackerel to grill. He waits for the ocean to warm up. He waits to turn twenty. </p><p>It's not particularly significant when he decides to stop waiting for people. </p><p>(He forgets that most lost things cannot find their way home on their own.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Trophy

“Romantic, isn’t it?”

Rin’s smile has unsettled him since the very beginning. It makes Haru want to shake him, ask him what he’s so happy about all the time. He’s always been tempted to pinch and tug at Rin’s cheeks to see if it was made of skin, like normal people’s, and not easily stretched elastic, like the goggle straps he was so fond of snapping. _Why are you looking at me like that?_

Haru responds the way he does to most things: he glances away. He feels like every downward pull at his frown only makes Rin’s smile widen in turn, unconsciously; the two of them forever in competition even in their mannerisms. Thankfully, Rin turns his attention back to the burial of the trophy, smearing dirt all over his face and laughing with Makoto and Nagisa over something Haru didn’t get to hear. Not that he cares. The time capsule was just another one of Rin’s flighty ideas that sounded pretty, but meant nothing in the end. Like the bricks, like the relay.

He steps back and sits under the shade of a nearby tree, watching them go at it. He’s done his part, and he wants to go swimming. He’ll jump in the pool later when he’s alone; maybe he’ll let Makoto stick around. Haru won’t listen to him if he talks too much though.

He sticks his shovel in the ground and staunchly ignores the tightness in his chest.

*

Haru only realizes why he found Rin so unsettling the day he leaves for Australia. It’s not just his smiles, or how Haru’s stomach feels funny when he’s around or how Haru’s mind races when he isn’t; it’s everything about him that makes Haru want to run away. He doesn’t have to now, though, because Rin’s doing it for him. For once, Rin isn’t being bothersome.

The victory doesn’t last long.

Rin’s blinking back tears, but Haru stays impassive, raising his hand once to wave goodbye. Then he walks home, shoving his fists in his pockets, scratching at the lining with his nails. There’s one nagging thought he can’t get rid of, even when he breaks into a sprint, even when he’s doubled over and gasping for breath, having to lean on his knees.

_How dare you how dareyouhowdareyoumakemefeelsomething._

*

The absence of school never really registers for Haru—only that it means he can stay in the water for nearly as long he wants without having to sit in class or do homework. Things seem quieter without Rin stirring up trouble, and Haru feels just fine with that. Great, even.

Everything goes back to normal. Nagisa hangs around, longer than Haru guessed he might, but otherwise all traces of Rin ever having stepped into their lives seems to be fading. If Haru willingly floats closer to where the other members are playing around, or if they catch him with the corners of his lips flickering upwards, then that’s all just purely coincidental.

Nothing to do with Rin at all.

He doesn’t glare at the phone either, not hoping it’ll ring and his mother will pick up, say it’s for him.

*

He surprises himself by signing up for the swim club at their middle school. Makoto looks at him like he hung the moon, and for once he welcomes it, doesn’t try to look elsewhere.

*

It’s been almost a year since they first met. Of course Rin would pick that time to reappear.

*

“Haru?”

All the drowsiness evaporates from his eyes, because he knows that voice, and that hair, and—

He runs across the tracks the moment the boom lifts. He skids to a halt right in front of Rin and nearly chokes from the feeling that hits him, propelling his heart to his throat and making his eyes water.

_I missed you I missedyouImissedyou._

He doesn’t hide it; he nearly laughs from the sheer joy. Words tumble out without his usual hesitation because it’s _Rin_ , and he has to know absolutely everything, Haru could’ve told him before because he should have called _but it’s okay that you didn’t_ , because he’s here now.

Sure, they can go swimming together. Like always. They can race. Anything Rin wanted.

Nothing will change.

*

There’s something chewing at his insides; he feels sick, sick to _death_ , though he doubts a visit to the doctor can fix it. Only Rin can, and Rin’s gone.

He only remembers it because it’s over. Rin’s light had dulled, a far cry from its previously boisterous shine; Haru didn’t notice right away because it’s been so long, and he’d been so excited. Rin never used to look at the ground that often before, and he had never dished out smiles like they were forced, or numbered.

He never used to cry when he lost, especially not to Haru, and it wasn’t the kind that could be ignored. It wasn’t Rin bawling at graduation or tearing up whenever anyone mentioned the ending of Titanic. This is Rin on his knees, hands balled up and shoulders wobbly; this is Rin with his eyes to the floor like he was daring it to swallow him whole.

Haru barely catches up to him after they’d gotten dressed. Rin flinches out of his touch, and that was strange, and it _hurt._ Haru wouldn’t have done it so often to his friends if he’d known how much.

“I quit,” Rin says, before leaving him behind again.

*

If Coach Sasabe hadn’t been there too, he could’ve sworn Rin was a ghost or a doppelganger, or pinned everything on a nightmare. But there’s proof in Rin’s abandoned goggles, and a witness in the form of a man with something like sympathy in his gaze.

“I have to lock up now, Haru.”

He nods absently and walks on ahead, because Coach seemed like he was about to say something else and Haru has no room in his heart for other voices. He’ll gladly go deaf from the one he was hearing if he can understand what it means.

 _I’m done with swimming. I’m done with_ you _._

*

When he announces that he isn’t going to compete anymore, Makoto doesn’t ask why. They ride their bikes in silence. Haru wonders if Makoto can see right through him, if he’s scared of the monster gnawing at Haru’s ribs.

He doesn’t miss it half as much as he misses Rin, and after a while that trickles out too. There’s a space within him now, under flesh and sinew, that he imagines filling up with water. The cold settles right down into bone and there’s sloshing in his ears even on dry land, but it also makes his vision swell with green and blue, washing out the memory of red.

Makoto smiles for the both of them, and that’s enough, though it’s never as wide as it should be.

*

Obaasan dies in her sleep, quietly and ordinarily. His parents move to Tokyo after he turns sixteen. The two events aren't correlated in the least; similar only in how they add salt to the water in his lungs.

He waits for money to be added in his bank account. He waits for his mackerel to grill. He waits for the ocean to warm up. He waits to turn twenty.

It's not particularly significant when he decides to stop waiting for people.

*

_Please stop doing this to me._

It's the closest he'll ever get to begging, and he doesn't even say it out loud. He's not sure what he means by it. _Stop coming back_ is simple; a blunt object of a sentence, but it has never been simple between them. Not back when their voices were still high-pitched and unbroken, not now that the roundness of their faces have given way to sharp edges—Rin's more so than his.

 _Stop stepping into my world and acting like it's yours to turn_ is dramatic, trite, and completely accurate. His feet are planted firmly on the ground, but when Rin beckons him with a wave of his hand, Haru follows. The ground shifts to tilt him forward, and distantly he’s aware of Makoto and Nagisa in the background. It’s a mockery of what they were five years ago. He should have been ashamed at how fast the blood rushed in his veins when Rin said, “Let’s race.”

Suddenly he’s twelve again and all that mattered was being with Rin in the water. _Stop making me want your company so badly_ isn’t quite right either, but it’s the closest he’s come.

Neither of them is thinking straight, of course; it’s a small comfort to know Rin is just as out of it as he is. Still, he leaves and takes his scathing new attitude with him without so much as a backwards glance. Haru takes the clothes Makoto offers to him and refuses to look at the trophy in Nagisa’s hands. Did Rin know it wouldn’t break when he dropped it? Would he have cared if it did?

_You used to care the most. Remember?_

_I drew a line in the sand and you laughed in my face._

*

It’s entirely his fault the second time. He let Nagisa rope him into it, dragging poor Makoto behind them. He challenges Rin, because he’s never known how to handle him, not really—was only just learning to mirror his smiles before realizing Rin wouldn’t return them anymore—but he’s positive about how Rin would respond to competition. If anything, Rin would reflect his own intensity at him a hundredfold. It would be almost normal.

He isn’t wrong about the first part.

“You win,” he says. Makoto didn’t need to announce it. Before he can think it over, he adds, “that’s a relief.”

He doesn’t expect Rin to parrot him, nearly spitting the words out; not for Rin to grab his goggles and yank him across the lane. His eyes are foreign in their viciousness; the body of water inside Haru turns to ice reflexively, to avoid being cut. There’s an echo he feels rather than hears, something that had unsettled him. _Why are you looking at me like that?_

The spreading cold in his chest shuts him down and it’s what fuels the rage contorting Rin’s face, whether he was conscious of it or not.

_I’d smile if you’d do it with me._

_We’re right back where we started._

*

Nagisa is a pest, but he’s a pest who still looks at Haru like he did when they were kids: bright-eyed and unabashedly adoring, though his brand of hero worship didn’t exempt Haru from being the butt of a joke or two, and that was refreshing. Endearing, even. He was also impossible to dissuade once he’d set his sights on something; Haru would have better luck freeing himself from a great white’s jaws (hah).

Neither of them ask about what made him quit the first time around, and he isn’t about to tell. “Knock yourself out,” he says, under a careful veneer that he hopes conveyed that he’s merely in it for the pool. Nagisa cheers, while Makoto seems simultaneously anxious and pleased.

Haru doesn’t have the heart to ask, _what makes you think Rin wants to see us?_ Nor the courage to admit that reason Rin is no longer their friend is standing right beside them.

*

Rin feigns indifference at joint practice. Haru knows better, because he does exactly the same. Rin waves off Kou's questions and Haru leaves all the fussing over their tentative member to Makoto and Nagisa. He pretends he’s only here to swim, like Rin pretends he isn’t going to watch.

Haru instinctively jumps in after Rei when they see him sink, but doesn't stick around to listen to his explanation. They won't be here long, and their own pool won't be useable until the weather gets warmer. He dives, and the world goes quiet, if only for a minute.

There are a dozen eyes on him, but there's a pair that seems to radiate one-part envy and one-part hate. He's not sure which he prefers, or if he'd even like an answer.

When he finishes his spurt, he doesn't look up.

*

Matsuoka Kou is a soft, aching reminder of her brother; it's not just the obvious resemblance. She takes on the role of manager like it's second nature, alternates between smiles and glares when it suits her, doesn't take no for an answer, and—

"I think he'll be closer to his dream if he's with you guys."

—she'll do anything for her family.

*

"Don't cry if you lose."

He's always been callous, but this is a rare moment of cruelty, even for him;  _it’s the cold_ , he reasons, it’s the layer of ice on his skin that’s protecting him. He’s allowed to be selfish once in a while; this is exhaustion disguised as pride and he’s so, so tired of fighting.

Rin’s features rearrange into that wounded look he wears so well (and now this can only be a war.)

*

He doesn't think about how close he'd been to losing Makoto. 

He told them it was a bad idea from the start, the whole situation had been avoidable, they were alive only because they were lucky because it certainly wasn't because they were smart... All these were admonishments that made it to the tip of his tongue, though not any further. It would only ruin the cheerful atmosphere Nagisa tried so valiantly to create, make Rei feel worse than he already does, and cause Makoto to retreat further into himself, shouldering everyone's burdens as always.

So he doesn't think about it.

He eats mackerel as often as they'd let him, he joins in beach activities and lets them pretend their happiness is infectious. He trains, harder than his body is used to after so many years of lethargy—enough to make his muscles ache in the late nights. Sleeping on the ground probably doesn't help, but it does give him an excuse when Makoto asks why he's not sleeping.

His oldest friend doesn't buy it for a second. Makoto laughs quietly, face turned towards him. "I think Rei's learned his lesson, Haru-chan."

_Yes, but have you?_

*

He doesn't think about losing anyone else.

*

"This means I'll never swim with you again," Rin says, grinning like he'd just been told a genie was granting him three wishes. He hasn't seen Rin smile like that since the relay, and he took them for granted back then. If he'd known they would become a rarity, he'd have collected them, memorized the shape of each one to decipher the emotions behind them later...

"Never." Then Rin isn't smiling anymore, and his back is turned, and he's walking away. Again. Again. The ice cracks, and the water inside of Haru overflows. It wasn't protection after all but a prison, and the walls are collapsing. He can't see straight. He feels like he's drowning. He's such a good swimmer, how can he be drowning?

How can this be happening again?

He knows he should be getting out of the pool but his arms won't move. Rin's face is a painting in his mind, and the meaning of his smile was clear as the night sky was so inexplicably, unstoppably dark.

_Finally, I'm rid of you. And you're rid of me._

_This is what you always wanted, isn't it?_

*

It's not. It's _not._  

Haru had been hoping to win; hoping that the prize would be Rin's hand, extended towards him. He'd been hoping to lose in a fair fight, cementing himself as the lesser of the two of them, if that meant Rin could get back the confidence Haru had stolen. If that meant Rin would smile at him again. That much he knows now, not that it would do him any good. Maybe he was stupid for believing that one race would be enough to smooth everything over. 

Maybe he was stupid, period, for thinking he'd ever been worth Rin's time.

*

He lets his feet lead him, and they take him to the pool on instinct. He's running on autopilot. Strip down, swan dive, sink as deep as possible.

He lingers, because this has always been where he belonged, but each breath is still labored, and there are sloshing noises in his lungs. The water isn't helping. The moon won't answer him. Who is he swimming for?

*

The phone call is a surprise.

If he were a different sort of person, someone more open and affectionate, he'd hug Makoto every day. Makoto deserved that much, for waiting, for picking him up in the mornings, for putting up with him. And the rest of the team deserved someone who'd swim for them too. 

Haru's not sure if he can be that, but he can try. 

"We have a relay to swim, right?"

*

This relay isn't like his (first and) last one, but that was to be expected. They're doing this for different reasons; this isn't a replacement. That said, Makoto and Nagisa's strokes haven't changed while Rei does his best, and the stroke is entirely his own, it doesn't remind him of—

His gaze wanders and connects. Rin's eyes are trained right at him, and for the few seconds Haru allows himself to linger, the emotion he reads there is suspiciously akin to _betrayal._  

But that can't be right, can it? Rin wanted nothing to do with them, with him anymore. That was it. He puts the thought away and waits for Rei's hands to touch the wall.

He dives in. He swims. They win.

When he takes Makoto's hand the world seems to blur. He registers only Nagisa's full weight making him stagger, his name in Rei's voice, Makoto's airy laughter, and it's enough to draw a conclusion from. They're happy. He helped make that happen. His own needs can come later, after the medal ceremony, the ride home, the victory dinner Nagisa insisted on (but absolutely refused to pay for). 

He puts it off until the last class of their next school day, but the water is as unresponsive as ever. 

*

It only clicks when he realizes why they'd been so insistent on the festival: they wanted to make him happy too. 

He spends the rest of the night trying to return the sentiment, and it becomes little easier to breathe.

*

The news of Rin's involvement in the relay fires them up, gives them the push to train harder. All except one.

He noticed it earlier, at Coach Sasabe's house, but the pull of nostalgia had been too strong. It was comforting to slip back into those days, to use those photos to bury the ugly memory that sullied the rest of them. It couldn't last, of course.

It was only right that Rei, who sought answers instead of waiting for them to find him, would be the one to unearth it.

"I'm part of the team too."

It was about time he told them, anyway.

*

It's the night before regionals, and when Rei screws up his order, Haru turns to laugh into Makoto's shoulder. Makoto's laughing too, but his eyes widen a fraction, and the smile he's suddenly wearing is decidedly not one of amusement.

"What is it?"

"Nothing, Haru-chan," he says, fond smile still in place. It occurs to him that it may have been years since he's laughed in Makoto's presence. 

 _You're a saint_ , Haru wanted to say to him, when they were both in their beds and unable to sleep, but he settles for, "I'm glad you're here with me." _I couldn't have made it this far without you._

The effect is the same.

*

Hazuki Nagisa, contrary to popular belief, is not invincible. Haru really shouldn't be so surprised, because that was precisely what all his friends seemed to be doing lately.

"None of this would've been possible without you," and this time he says exactly what he means. "Thank you."

The ensuing hug nearly kills him, but that isn't anything new.

*

He wishes the tree was in bloom.

It's the same thing he wished for five years ago, so he wouldn't have to see Rin's face fall.

*

Something is horribly, horribly wrong. Haru sees the shape of it when Rin falters into position, when his weak jump translates to a late start; it materializes when Rin doesn't make it up on the turn, when he seems to struggle to stay afloat, much less swim at his best.

It's ugly and heavy, and it causes enough drag to make him finish last. It's latched onto his back, wrapped around his bones, and his arms quiver at the weight of it. It won't let him leave the pool.

Haru's on his feet in an instant, and the rest of the team's on his heels. 

 _I have to yank it off him. I have to help Rin. I have tohelp_. His eyes are burning, his chest is caving in. _Ineedto._

They run towards a loud and angry noise, just in time for

*

Water rushes over his head; the sound of it fills his ears. His nostrils are stinging from the salt he's inhaled. He's whispering to himself and his voice is distorted, far away _I won't get to swim with Rin again?_

(how can he speak when he can't even _breathe_ )

It's so deep, so, so cold where he is, and he's so alone, but Rei comes as the biggest surprise of them all.

"Because I feel the same way he does."

The admission makes Haru realize what he's known all along, buried under waves upon waves of guilt, often disguised as other things. 

"I want to swim with Rin," he says, tone resolute—the same one he used when he snapped, full of childish indignation _, Don't include me in your relay_ —and the water recedes.

_I've only ever been sure about you._

*

It didn't even cross their minds because they never would have asked it of Rei. They owed him too much for leaving track to fill the spot in their club, for working harder than all of them combined, for daring to take a chance on four strangers who couldn't make sense of him. He was too important. It didn't seem logical to anyone else. 

So he was the one to say it. 

"Are you really okay with that?"

Rei's answering grin, full of things they'll have to decipher later, waves away any lingering hesitation.

*

There's little room to worry about competition rules or what's at stake for nationals, and Haru simply could _not_ care less about the stares he attracts when he all but screams his lungs out. Rin's the only one his voice needs to reach, after all. 

( _It’s a fact that sound travels faster underwater, Haruka-senpai.)_

He's panting when he looks at the clock and the twenty minutes they had has turned to ten. He was always running out of time.

*

In the end, Rin is exactly where Haru thought he would be, but the battle is only half-over. When he turns and speaks Haru's name, it's filled with resentment and apprehension still, but Haru knows it's only the surface now, and what it's supposed to be hiding.

He barely gets a word in before Rin launches into a furious tirade, all its arrows aimed at himself. "I said laugh," he screams and his voice cracks, and for one horrifying moment Haru thinks, _what if I'm too late, what if I can't save you, what if what I have to offer_

 _is not enough_ but he shoves it into the back of his mind. He roots himself in place, nails digging into his palms and Rin might mistake it for aggression but he can't contain it anymore, the truth that explained all his actions ever since he was twelve and afraid of his stuttering heart.

"You're the reason," he says, as Rin grabs him by the front of his jacket. "I found the answer," as Rin shakes him and pleads, _shut up._

"Why I swim," something like fear plays itself across Rin's face. "Who I'm swimming for." He catches Rin's fist before it could connect and both of them stagger to the ground, each trying to gain the upper hand. Haru's certain he's gripping Rin's wrists hard enough to bruise, but if he lets go then Rin might disappear for good, and he can't risk that, he _can't_ , not after all of this.

And then it stops. 

*

_There you are,_ he smiles, as Rin's tears slide down his own cheeks. 

(If he were Makoto he might offer his handkerchief to wipe them with; if he were Nagisa he'd smother Rin with an embrace. Kou would say something earnest and sweet, and even Rei might pat his back in an attempt at comfort. But he's no one but himself, and he doesn't make a move. He doesn't need to.)

When the team arrives Rin is red-eyed and incredulous, his expression so _open_ when Haru offers his hand. 

_There are some demons we have to drown together._

*

He waits for Rin's fingers to touch the wall.

*

They place first, but it doesn't quite sink in, not with Makoto helping him get out of the pool, not with Nagisa's hapless whimpering—not until Rin's arms are around him, nearly throwing him off balance again.

He hears a number of things in what Rin says next but all he thinks in response is, _it's nothing you haven't already done for all of us._

_For me._

They even coax a laugh out of him, though he seems ready to start crying again when he thanks Rei and insists that he join them for the group photo. It flusters Rei and delights Nagisa to no end, but they're all grinning when they pose for the camera.

Well, except for him.

"Think you'll smile for this one, Haru?" Rin teases, arm slung over his shoulder, and the weight of it is heavy and familiar. Haru's sorely tempted, but.

One thing at a time.

*

"How about that, Haru-chan," Makoto says when he's caught looking out the window on the bus ride back to Iwatobi. The sunset was different today; beautiful, in Rei's lexicon. He'd say it himself if Nagisa wasn't currently torturing him in the seat behind them.

"Hm?"

"You're smiling after all."

"Not another word." He shifts and (pretends to) frown, leaning his head on Makoto's shoulder for a nap. Makoto only shakes his head fondly and lowers the shoulder to accommodate him.

*

"What about you, Haru?"

"Me?"

_I’m coming with you._

*

It’s the middle of April and there are sakura petals in Rin’s bag, having sneaked their way on top of his things when he’d forgotten to zip it up earlier.

“We could dump them in the pool,” Haru says. “Then you could swim in it.”

Rin scowls, as if that could nullify the flush along his throat. “Shut up.” Then, as an afterthought, “it’ll be a pain to clean up, anyway.”

Haru jumps into Samezuka’s pool to hide the quirk of his lips, floating on his back until Rin joins him and their idle warm-up laps subconsciously, inevitably turn into a race. Neither of them gives the start signal as much as they just begin swimming faster when in parallel lanes, and they both come up for air in what seems like the same moment.

“Who won?” Rin says, pushing his goggles up to his hairline. Haru shrugs and pulls himself out of the pool, sitting on the edge and letting his legs stay in the water. “Who cares?”

Rin raises an eyebrow, and Haru is perfectly aware that he’s veering off their well-practiced script, but there’s the pristine image of Rin in his mind, of him looking up to the trees in bloom and having the red of his hair contrast with their pink surroundings, and all of the cold water’s gone from Haru’s chest but it doesn’t feel empty, it feels warm and occupied and—

Soft. Rin’s mouth is soft and cool as he presses it to the patch of Haru's skin where thigh meets knee, light to the touch. He glances down and Rin’s looking at the water, and it’s quiet everywhere but the hollows of his ribcage where his heartbeat is taking precedence.

“Rin.” There’s a pulse in each of his fingertips as he combs them through Rin’s hair, willing them not to shake. “How long?”

“Even back then, you took up too much space in my head. But,” Rin sighs just as Haru inhales. “I guess it was the relay.

“I didn’t see anything different from anyone else; I just took it too far, as always.” He lifts his eyes up to Haru’s and they’re shiny, but happy, because he’s smiling and it’s no longer unsettling, because Haru can finally name the explosions inside himself.

“Romantic, isn’t it?”

(It feels like _winning_.)

 

**Author's Note:**

> I've been working on this since episode 9, god. Please leave a comment if you're inclined ♥


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